ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
At the Paris Olympics tomorrow, a group of very large men will gather inside the Stade de France to take part in one of the oldest and most historic competitions, the shot put - a battle to see who can toss a small 16-pound ball the farthest. References to something sounding similar to the shot put go back to nearly the first century. In 2024, there is one man who stands out above the others - American Ryan Crouser. Steve Futterman reports.
STEVE FUTTERMAN, BYLINE: When you meet Ryan Crouser, he is a physically imposing figure.
RYAN CROUSER: So I'm Ryan Crouser, two-time Olympic gold medalist and world record holder in the shot put.
FUTTERMAN: Crouser is 6 feet 7, weighs 320 pounds, and he has turned the shot put into something resembling a personal Ph.D dissertation. He obsessively keeps records of everything he does involving the shot put.
CROUSER: Always been a math, science, numbers type of guy. So I like hard data for sure.
FUTTERMAN: This is probably Crouser's landmark moment, back at the 2021 U.S. track and field trials, broadcast by NBC Sports...
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NBC BROADCAST)
CROUSER: (Vocalizing).
UNIDENTIFIED ANNOUNCER #1: He knew it immediately. It almost went out of the sector.
FUTTERMAN: ...Breaking the world record that had been held for more than 30 years.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NBC BROADCAST)
UNIDENTIFIED ANNOUNCER #1: One of the oldest records on the books - he's been chasing it all year.
(CHEERING)
UNIDENTIFIED ANNOUNCER #2: Seventy-six feet, 8 1/4 inches.
DWIGHT STONES: You know, you start out with coming from a family that throws things. That doesn't hurt when you've been exposed to it really, really, really young.
FUTTERMAN: Dwight Stones is a two-time Olympic bronze medalist in the high jump. He has been following the 31-year-old's career from the start.
STONES: You know, he was a phenom in high school. And he just continued to improve. I mean, the guy just continues to improve. It's like he doesn't have a plateau, and I'm not certain what his ceiling is.
FUTTERMAN: Crouser learned the shot put from his father, Mitch, who nearly made the 1984 U.S. Olympic team. As a youngster, Ryan would try in a childlike way to emulate his dad. Al Feuerbach is a former world record holder and the second man to throw over 70 feet.
AL FEUERBACH: The most amazing thing to me about Ryan Crouser is that when he throws, it looks so easy. I mean, you could call it an illusion of ease.
FUTTERMAN: It may look simply like a big, strong man trying to toss a 16-pound weight, but Crouser says the shot put is an intricate balance of strength and motion as you build up power and momentum inside a small 7-foot diameter circle.
CROUSER: It's a full-body movement - a lot of sprints, a lot of plyometrics. So you're training everything. We train sprints like a sprinter. Our plyometrics are very, very dynamic, as well as almost like an Olympic weightlifter meets a long-drive golfer.
FUTTERMAN: Crouser won the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in 2016 and then again three years ago in Tokyo. Now he is trying to become the first person to win the event three straight times. But more than that, Crouser is striving for perfection.
CROUSER: The search for that perfect throw with the perfect preparation, I really don't think it will ever happen. So you're kind of chasing - you're chasing the white buffalo in the sense that it exists in your mind, but it's something that you try to put into existence, but is virtually impossible.
FUTTERMAN: Crouser has been dealing with elbow problems this entire year. But now, here in France, he says he's ready to defend his Olympic title. For NPR News, I'm Steve Futterman at the Summer Olympics in Paris. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.